Samsung Electronics has announced the expansion of its ‘Smart Home’ portfolio at IFA 2014. The new range of services and products are reportedly designed to increase home safety, improve energy management, adapt to in-home location and operate by voice command.
Samsung UK & Ireland vice president of consumer electronics Robert King commented: “We are excited to deliver a Smart Home experience which will make our customers’ lives easier, with innovative products that help everyone’s day to day routine, such as managing home security and energy consumption. We are thrilled to be leading the way in making the Smart Home possible for our customers worldwide.”
With the expansion of its Smart Home portfolio which includes third party devices, the service is designed to cater for all aspects of the modern smart home, from digital door locks to IP cameras and smart plugs. These devices work with Samsung Electronics’ entire product range.
Samsung says that energy management is at the forefront of many people’s minds. The Samsung Smart Home service monitors the amount of electricity used by energy intensive appliances such as air-conditioners and displays the expected cost of the energy consumption. People can then monitor their electricity usage, whether daily or monthly, and set new targets to help reduce bills. According to Samsung, it is also possible to set a monthly maximum electricity allowance for each device and appliance and when the limit approaches a pop-up is sent to the person.
New location awareness services enable devices in the home to automatically turn on via location recognition technology. For example, the lights and air conditioner will switch on automatically when a consumer approaches their home.
People can also activate their appliances using S Voice, the voice recognition service embedded in the wearable Gear series as well as via Galaxy smartphones. A number of voice commands have been preloaded to provide give specific instructions to a range of devices and Samsung plans to expand the compatibility of its Smart Home offering to products from other devices and appliance manufacturers alongside additional Samsung products.
“We plan to build a truly open smart home ecosystem by actively incorporating a variety of services and platforms into the cloud, as well as by opening up Samsung’s platform to developers,” added Robert King. “The Samsung Smart Home will continue to evolve through the development of new services that enable people to enjoy their lives in smart ways.”
Samsung Smart Home will be on display at IFA 2014 from September 5-10, 2014 and will be located on Level 2 of CityCube Berlin.
